a tiny peek at home

It's been a good long while since I've shared any peeks into our home life, mostly because I've fallen a bit out of love with our space, but in an effort to embrace the remaining 6 months we have here I thought I'd take pictures of my favorite bits to share. Here are two spaces (or vignettes) I'm happy to show off; above the beloved objects on my dresser and below Ryan's side of the bed. You can see my side here.

I love so many of the objects found in our home from the silly broken globe, to my great grandmother's dress hanging on the wall, to my one legged wooden model holding necklaces. It's not the objects we're tired of but the lack of walls and space to put them. I don't want to forget our first apartment in Philadelphia so I'm going to make an effort to snap more pictures in the future. What do you say, can you hold me to it? big kiss, bekuh

Little Nests Everywhere

I promised a peek at our new decor on Monday, and I'm keeping that promise. Though we haven't hung any art on the walls, and there are still empty boxes in our hallway, things are shaping up nicely. Little signs of progress in every "room." Having let go of so much it's fun finding new homes for our favorite things. Art supplies and music equipment intermingle happily. Our furniture is a mix of new and old; and everything is cozy and bright.

Nesting in this new home is going to bring me a lot of happy moments. It's our first home where we both have an equal say in the flow and design of the space. It's becoming even more obvious that we're perfect for one another. You know if color choices, and design dictate perfect matches. big kiss, bekuh

Flowers at Home

Our home is a hot house of florals right now. Every room is bursting with blooms, and the happy little buds make me feel more alive despite the cold. They're calling for snow today, the first snow of the year for SW Virginia, and I'm crossing my fingers it actually sticks. I love the idea of looking outward and seeing a blanket of white, and inward at my own personal paradise. Today, I want to share the beauty in my home with you in yours.

I'd be lying if I said that I bought these flowers unprovoked, they were actually an assignment I was reluctant to complete. As part of the January Cure, we are told each week to buy our home some flowers. I used to think buying flowers without reason was wasteful, and a silly expense, but now I'm starting to see them a little differently. These flowers are a symbol of fresh ideas, happiness, and life. I quite like them. I hope you have the most beautiful day, mine is starting off wonderfully. big kiss, bekuh

Make It: Easy Instagram Art

I made a promise to myself years, and years ago that when I grew up I'd only have original art, and artist prints in my home. Though I've been pretty good at keeping to this, there have definitely been times that I look at an empty wall and think to myself, "Maybe I should just buy that box store art this one time." My inner decorator gets sad at half dressed rooms. To combat this urge to buy cheap reproductions, or mass produced art I've made the decision to incorporate creative photo displays using our own photographs. Enter this easy instagram project...

The supplies you'll need for this project is are pretty minimal. I used a 16"x20" frame, a white matte of the same size with a cut out of 9"x12", a large piece of thick paper (like bristol paper), photo corners, acid-free masking tape, 4"x4" instagram photos, and a black marker. I use PostalPix to print all of instagram photos, but everything else can be found at your local craft store.

The first step is to tape the bristol paper to the back of your matte, using the masking tape. Flip the matte back over, and arrange your instagram photos down the center of the bristol paper. I was only able to fit three down, but could have easily put two across if I wanted it to look a little fuller. I wanted to add a couple of fun captions next to my photos, so I offset them slightly to make room for the text.

Once you've arranged your instagram photos the way you like, peel off a couple of photo corers and start placing them on each point of your photo. Press the photo back into the paper, and continue until all of them are pressed down completely. Next, pick up your pen and write the captions next to your photos if you like. I didn't do anything fancy, just a brief description of the photo. I think it kind of makes them look like artifacts, or scientific specimen.


All you have left to do once you've gotten your captions written, is to put the matte in your frame and hang. The entire project took me less than 20 minutes, and it will hang in our home for a long time. Have you been refreshing your decor lately, what kind of projects have you been doing?  big kiss, bekuh

Downsizing By Half

I mentioned a couple of days ago that Ryan and I are going to attempt to get rid of about half our apartment in the coming year, and today I want to talk a little more about that. I'm sure some of you are probably flabbergasted by that statement, or think that we're some kind of loonies, or think we're doing this because it's the new year (and that's what people do). There may be some truth to all of those thoughts, but this decision goes much deeper. There is a very practical end goal for me, and a very personal one.

First, we are a small family of 3 (Ryan, myself, and Nellie), but we currently live in a three bedroom apartment. Not just any three bedroom apartment though, a large three bedroom apartment that is bigger than a lot of our friends' homes. I'm not bragging, I'm embarrassed by this. There is no reason for us to rent so much space, 2 people and a dog should require much less.

Currently both Ryan and I have our own rooms for art and music, and though that has been a wonderful perk of our living situation, it's a little unnecessary. Both of our rooms are so full that we don't even have a guest bed. On top of the art and music room we have an eat in kitchen, a separate dining room, two walk in closets, several other storage spaces, and again they are all full. We're certainly not hoarders, but we've accumulated a lot of fluff and excess furnishings that need to be shed. By getting rid of half the stuff we could potentially move into a nicer 1 bedroom apartment, and potential save money by doing so.

My second reason for downsizing is the emotional toll that having an excess of stuff can have on a person. Holding onto knickknacks or things with no purpose in our life binds us to them and creates an unhealthy attachment. We can't take anything with us when we die, so why fight and grasp for it while we're here? In addition to being attached to objects in an unhealthy way, I also think it attaches us to negative memories, and parts of our past that can hold us back from realizing our full potential.

For example, I was looking through my "memory" box and noticed a giant manilla folder that my mom had filled with old report cards, and classroom assignments. In the midst of all the glowing teacher reviews, and colored pages were a few handwriting samples that I'd received poor marks on. I instantly thought about my handwriting, and how much I dislike. In my head I started imagining ways to improve, wondering if my handwriting was holding me back. When really at this point my handwriting is my handwriting sloppy or not. Seeing those old grades sent me down a negative spiral of self doubt, and over analysis. Why let two bad grades from 2nd grade bring me down now? By cleaning out those folders, and only keeping one or two things I'm releasing myself from some negative feelings/memories. Sometimes the negative things in our past have no place in our current situation. They need to be tossed, and forgotten.

Outside of the space issues, and the emotional issues there's also this key fact: Ryan and I didn't pick out our current apartment together. I had lived in the apartment for a year before we were married. As silly as it may seem I've always felt like our apartment has been divided between his things, and my things. So, it's my hope that at the end of this downsizing we can find a place where both of us feel contented and happy as a couple. I no longer want there to be "Ryan things" and "Bekuh things," just "Our things." It's going to be challenging, painful, and at times maddening, but in the end its going to be totally worth it. I hope you'll join us as we downsize in 2013. big kiss, bekuh

Our Before and After Bedroom

One of the biggest projects Ryan and I have tackled together since getting married is decorating our bedroom. I thought I'd show you the before and after progress of the room as we've hung all but one picture on the wall and everything happily has a home in our room now. 

Before:

When my roommate Lauren and I moved into the apartment we had three rooms to choose from as our bedrooms. I decided on the "bonus room" which wasn't technically a bedroom because it doesn't have a closet, but thankfully our apartment has a plethora of closets so I was able to choose another and have a room with lots of windows. Two of the walls are entirely made of windows and I have beautiful french doors leading into my space, and a door close to the bathroom as well. An ideal situation if I do say so myself.

After Ryan and I got married we decided it was time for a major facelift as we were already going to have a "new" bed that was Ryan's bed growing up. We painted the walls a dusty blueish gray and got straight to work decorating. I'm quite pleased with the results.

After:

It was fun choosing, combining, mixing and matching our two styles into one cohesive feeling room. I love the screen printed show posters of Ryan's hung with a drawing I bought in Italy and the embroidery I made for our wedding. I'm especially found of the old college pennant trashcan that was in my Papaw's den all of my childhood. I think our bedroom is the perfect reflection of the two of us and we love it! What do you think of our bedroom transformation? big kiss, bekuh

Chores: Making the Bed

I've talked a little about chores before (doing dishes) and how I'm just not a big fan. Well let's add to that list shall we, making the bed. Usually I'm the first to leave the house so Ryan makes the bed in the morning, but on the weekends it's kind of my job to pick up the slack and get to work. I'm just not motivated enough to do it. I hate having people over if the bed's not made but when no one but me is home I just don't care. 

Am I a human oddity? Does no one else see the senselessness of organizing something that no one but you will regularly see? Why do we add the 1.5 minutes extra to our schedule needlessly? These are the questions I ask myself when faced with yet another chore.

I've been posting a lot about the house this week, I think I'm newlywed nesting. I like it. big kiss, bekuh

Home at Last

There is nothing so sweet as coming home after a long trip away and looking at all the little familiar things. I love walking in the door and recognizing every part of home from Ryan's socks on the floor to the way the light in the dining room hits the pillows on the window seat. I find myself breathing in deep breaths and touching everything gingerly as if it might fade away like a dream.

This homecoming is especially wonderful because at last Ryan and I will be able to settle into together to a regular routine and enjoy a little newlywed bliss instead of constant separation. I love him so much and it has been hard to be away after a precious union just one month ago

What are your favorite things about coming home? big kiss, bekuh

Embroidered Love

With the wedding drawing closer I'll probably only share a few more posts with wedding details, but this project served double duty as I also plan to use it in decorating the house. It's kind of cheesy but I wanted to try my hand at embroidering on a non-traditional material and decided why not do something love related. 

I had purchased a sizable lot of vintage handkerchiefs on ebay and some of them were damaged so instead of throwing out the ones with beautiful designs I decided to repurpose them. 

I came up with the idea of embroidering our initials with a heart because Ryan and I have this dorky joke about our initials R&R having three very easily recognized meanings; rest and relaxation, rest room, and rail road. We've affectionately dubbed ourselves Rest-Road as a result. big kiss, bekuh